Military retirement pay basics for the final five years
Frame pension timing, spending targets, and transition risk before separation.
March 8, 2026
The last five years before retirement is where confidence is usually won or lost. A household does not need perfect market forecasts, but it does need a reliable pension estimate, a realistic spending target, and a clear bridge between active duty pay and civilian life.
A planning tool for military households should surface the handful of assumptions that drive the result: expected retirement age, current rank and service years, savings rate, spouse income, and housing changes after transition.
The goal is not to tell a household what to do. The goal is to make tradeoffs visible early enough that they can still be changed.